Pavel Zahrádka’s anthology offers a choice of translated studies in aesthetics and provides (and to a certain extent also, naturally, creates) a picture of the contemporary state of such studies based on the character of interdisciplinary work. The collection, which is gathered into nine thematic sections, covers such key themes as philosophical aesthetics and questions of the recently instituted (copyright as a philosophical-aesthetic problem) or the resurrected (the aesthetics of nature). It presents a rich palette of approaches, methods and themes which makes up the field of contemporary aesthetic research. This review study offers a commentary on the overall concept of the collection in the context of analogous foreign publications and gives a résumé of individual thematic sections, while it focuses in detail on select parts of the anthology, which represent a relatively contemporary understanding of the traditional key problems of general aesthetics (ontology, definition and the value of art).
The article attempts to present the role and accompanying genealogy of the category of site in art - proceeding from a phenomenological understanding of the site, through the materialist investigations of institutional critique and towards a discursive model extending beyond familiar art contexts. Since the reconfiguration of the site precipitates the reconfiguration of the place the artist occupies, it is attempted to designate an intricate situation of the artist, who departs from a modernist paradigm and assumes the role of a cultural-artistic service provider rather then a producer of artistic objects. This issue implicates the problem concerning the status of originality, authenticity, and authorship in site-specific art. Under these new circumstances art has become one of the many cultural practices that binds individuals into the social tissue, where the link between the work and its site has ceased to reflect the physical durability of the relations and consists in acknowledging its transience and impermanence. Accordingly, various cultural debates, theoretical concepts, social issues, political dilemmas, events of significance for a given community have assumed the role of new sites of art.
The purpose of this article is to describe the notion of art in accordance with Georg Simmel’s views. The author presents this philosopher’s stance by referring primarily to his essays related to art, such as On Aesthetic Quantities, The Picture Frame: An Aesthetic Study, and The Ear: An Aesthetic Study. The article focuses on the essence and the meaning of the art and the problem of the modern art.
This article is an introduction to the idea of tradition which is present in H.-G. Gadamer’s thoughts. The author analyzes tradition in the context of the art experience. In the first part the author of this paper describes tradition in the broader hermeneutic context. The author depicts tradition and, consecutively: understanding, hermeneutic experience, ‘historically effected consciousness’, horizon, authority, prejudice. The second part addresses specifically Gadamer's thoughts on the arts as an experience of tradition. Gadamer's hermeneutic theory is interpreted as a presumptive solution to the problem of contemporary culture.
My goal here is to provide a detailed analysis of the methods of inference that are employed in De prospectiva pingendi. For this purpose, a method of natural deduction is proposed. The treatise by Piero della Francesca is a manifestation of a union between the fine arts and the mathematical sciences of arithmetic and geometry. He defines painting as a part of perspective and, speaking precisely, as a branch of geometry, which is why we find advanced geometrical exercises here.
The traditional idea of aesthetics was connected to the sphere of art. Exclusively. Radical ideas of the avant-garde of the 20th century together with the expanding role of media and technology in contemporary culture led to broadening research of aesthetics. Contemporary aesthetics is interested in “aesthetic” in the broadest sense of this word. Thus, it is focused not only on art but also it is interested in everyday reality which is the very object of aesthetic processes. Most of all, however, it is focused on the relationship between art and various spheres of reality. One of the consequences of this changes is questioning the traditional hierarchy of senses with the sense of sight as prior. In my research I point at reasons for such hierarchy and I suggest some alternative ideas. According to the critics of the contemporary culture I mention in this work that balance to the hegemony of the sense of sight and vision may lie in the sense of hearing and sound as such. That is why I describe the metaphor connected to seeing and hearing and the vision of the world associated with it.
The opposition between traditional and new media (usually identified with te therm: electronic media) paradoxically contributed to creation of a specific artistic phenomenon. The space has becone not only a place or its illusion, but was treated as a tool for the creation of feedback: sending impulses but absorbent ones to reach him. Using space as a tool , the artist leads us into a state of uncertainly the status of the work. In fact, we do not know where it is entrenched because it’s ‘suspended’ in many objects but without the destination of their hierarchy. Who is considered the author, how to save and preserve it? This particular space we can name mixmedia space. It sets a new order in arts, not just visual. Enlargement of artistic space appears to be an permanence process and the infinite. The mixmedia space is only step in this continuity.
Text analyses selected examples of photography, painting and video installations (Bernhard Prinz, Bill Viola, Peter Holl, Adrian Gottlieb, Marcin Liber) stressing classical rules and inspirations, as well as elaborating context of visual turn (parallel to the end of art concept). Not only classical patterns and rules are presented but also weighty philosophical ideas are discovered with the use of transdisciplinary methods. Finally, the fundamental questions concerning aesthetic and metaphysical determinants of art in contemporary works are raised (Plato, Kant, Scheler) in context of human identity discovered in hermeneutic interpretation and experience of beauty.
How could we define aesthetic experience of new media? Which part of new media occupies computer-based art? I try to answer these questions with giving a stress on fundamentals. I make a presentation of five qualities which serves in a description of aesthetic experience of computer based art. Amongst of them there are textuality, limitlessness, tactility (proprioception), errorness and analetheia. The qualities mentioned above define aesthetic experience of art. In my approach art is limited to certain borders. These borders are established because of necessary condition which states that computer-based art is only there where creation and presentation of artifact is based on programming specific procedures.
The text is an attempt to draw attention on the artificially created and overly publicized „crisis” in contemporary art, and related to this, signaled by art critics and artists, the need to redefine the status of the artist, the characteristics and location of art works, as well as the recipient’s participation in the creative process. The pretext for the discussion was a picture of Norbert Schwontkowski Two artists talk about... and also the opinion of Arthur C. Danto, that „the art will always have something to do, if the artists are content with that.” Imaginary confrontation of artistic views of two discussing snowmen does not lead to clear conclusions, which, perhaps, once again confirms our belief that the art, especially the one that has „something to do,” is better to be created than to argued about.
„The end of art” means that art is marked by finitude, thrown into finitude and given over to its presentation. Finitude implies a lack of totality, the impossiblity of closing one's being in oneself, and, therefore, the necessity of being in relation, of being outside of oneself. Art that presents finitude is an art of being outside of itself. This means that every time there is art, it exists as something other than itself. This structure of „being-as” seems to be one of the main effects and meanings of “the end of art”. These theses are developed by way of an analysis of Hegel, the Jena Romantics, Danto and Kosuth's text Art after Philosophy.
Matter painting is interpreted in this article as a turning point in the development of the art history after modernism. We start from the analysis of the trauma that is depicted in the abstract painting of Malewicz and Kandinsky. The drama of the World War I is presented in the structure of “Black Square on the White Field” (1915) because of its radical lack of the figuration, that shows the traumatic gap in the history and narration ( as history develops always between the representations of certain figures). Then we turn to the cultural shifts inscribed in the matter painting and its structure of the signifiants, and interpret it in the terms of Lacanian psychoanalysis. Finally, we conceive of a parallel between the shits in the notion of sign in the modern and postmodern philosophy and the ontological changes of the work of art in abstract and matter painting.
In this paper I shall present the analysis and interpretation of the performance of Iwona księżniczka Burgunda by Witold Gombrowicz. The play was staged in The Opole Theatre of Puppet and Actor. I argue that use of puppets in this performance is the interesting method of emphasis of the problem of the Form, conventions and habits. Each character is built of two parts: a puppet expressing social role played by human, and an actor representing real face of each of a character concealed behind the veil of puppet in daily life. Iwona, who brings about social decomposition of the court, is shown by a stage-manager, Marián Pecko, as a formless demon destroying every form and principle, including the moral one. I interpret the performance in terms of liminal rituals described by anthropologist Victor Turner. This interpretation has at least two reasons: first, words of Gombrowicz himself who defined his works as an expression of some kind of rituals; second, use puppets which have always had a mythical and religious meaning..
The problem of determining the origins of the phenomenon of creativity Malevich is usually considered by researchers through the prism of the influence of Moscow’s artistic and cultural environment, not paying attention to the provincial period of the artist's life. Comparison of traditional Ukrainian culture and creative heritage of Malevich reveals the deep roots of the philosophy of his art, the system of the universe, encoded in the Neolithic Age.
One of the most famous parts of Heidegger's The Origin of the Work of Art is the passage in which he refers to the painting by van Gogh, which represents a pair of worn-out shoes. Considering the artist's oeuvre, the aforementioned painting did not seem to have a crucial significance, yet it elicited the most attention. The non-canonical and poetic interpretation by Heidegger has led to fierce criticism by art historian Meyer Schapiro. The discussion between the philosopher and art historian was understood as a collision of different methodologies. Schapiro accused Heidegger of a misinterpretation as he attributed the painted shoes to a peasant woman. In Schapiro's view, Heidegger's interpretation was a type of false projection that was not grounded in facts. Schapiro proposes the reading in which the painted object is intertwined (or interlaced) with the artist to the extent that it becomes a metonymic self-portrait. Schapiro's reattribution changes the painting's interpretation in the context of the origins of the represented object but also the class and gender of its owner. Also, by referring to a "relic," Schapiro seemed to open up the possibility of a theological interpretation; however, he did not elaborate on this matter. In his "polylogue" Derrida reflected on both interpretations, tracing their inconsistencies and accusing both authors of violence. The present article takes into account each of these texts to reflect on the ethics and limitations of interpretation, the origins of truth in painting, and the origin of the shoes depicted in van Gogh's artwork – as in this particular matter, all of those issues seem interlaced.
The article Sculptor and philosopher deals with the Romanian thinker Constantin Noica’s interpretations of Constantin Brâncuşi’s work. These interpretations are presented with regard to Noica’s philosophical concepts, in particular his reflections on Romanian culture and the sense of being manifested within it. Of fundamental importance in his interpretations is the category of becoming within being – the most important idea developed by Noica and which he applied in many fields of philosophy.
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The article Sculptor and philosopher deals with the Romanian thinker Constantin Noica’s interpretations of Constantin Brâncuşi’s work. These interpretations are presented with regard to Noica’s philosophical concepts, in particular his reflections on Romanian culture and the sense of being manifested within it. Of fundamental importance in his interpretations is the category of becoming within being – the most important idea developed by Noica and which he applied in many fields of philosophy.
The following text is an introductory to the issues included in the volume, and is focused on understanding history and two of its important concepts: progression and regression. Both of these concepts played an important part in understanding history, attributed to its sense or nonsense.
This is the second part of the investigations of melancholia. Melancholia is examined here in relation to one of its opposition, namely hope. Reflection on melancholia entails reference to conditions commonly regarded as aggravating: sadness, uncertainty, indecision, self-criticism, despair, disenchantment, fear, desperation or bitterness. This content is common both to melancholia and hope; the difference lies in the kind of behaviour it evokes. Not yet either hope or melancholia, it is already conspicuously developing the characteristics of one of the options. This moment is especially important in the process of artistic creation. The tension that appears between both poles enables the experiencing subject to feel indecision about its choice, and hence to ultimately declare itself on one or the other side.
This essay discusses several motifs derived from Stanisław Wyspiański’s thoughts: the signif icance of category decorative elements in art, critics of ideal ‘pure form’, inquisitive look at the nature of ‘existence’ and ‘being’, existential drama of ‘being a torch’, feelings of compassion in a context of beauty. In Wyspianski’s philosophy of art, floral elements, such as experience of a ‘flowery lover’, became a crucial element of his works. It includes his view of compassionate, merciful love which allows combining human drama of existence with metaphysical sense of existence. Wyspianski’s floral ornate monogram SW reflects his sense of identity.
One of the elements of allegorical representations of the alchemical opus is the nuptials motif composed of a white woman and a red man. The motif is presented in alchemical literature both in the form of illustrations and literary descriptions. The aim of the article is to present the motif, its symbolism and interpretation: both in the context of an esthetised account of the material dimension of alchemists’ activity, as well as referring to its psychological and philosophical aspects (as seen from Jung’s and Eliade’s perspective). The primary aim of the article, however, is an attempt to show the presence of symbolism employed in alchemical representations of nuptials in European painting and answering the following questions: How can this presence be explained? How to interpret a presented motif if we consider it in isolation from the symbolism of alchemical allegories?
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